The Vertical Gardening Guidebook Read Free

grow in a tight area, such as a balcony, rooftop or small space in your yard, then you will need to design your vertical garden in a way that will allow you easy access.
    Sounds obvious, I know, but I’ve seen people “wall off” parts of their yard with huge tomato plants or cucumber vines and then have to rip them out and start over with a better design. Just a little bit of thought ahead of time can save you a lot of money, time and effort once your garden is growing!
    Vertical Gardening Tip: You might want to draw a simple picture of your vertical garden design. It doesn’t need to be fancy at all, but just get the dimensions of your space and choose which plants you want to plant where. Drawing it out can help make the planning process a whole lot easier!
    Inside Your Home
    Indoor plants have always been popular with nature lovers. Why not try vertical gardening inside of your home?
    It’s already a growing trend throughout the world, simply because it gives more room for plants and you can keep animals and bugs away from your vegetables, herbs, fruits and flowers. The only thing you need to do to ensure their survival is to choose a location in your home that receives lots of sunlight.

    A vertical gardening panel like the one pictured above can be kept indoors and moved outdoors when the weather changes.
    If the vertical garden is mobile, you can move the garden outdoors on your patio or balcony to get extra sun for a few hours and then bring them back inside (although that can be a lot of work depending on how big your garden is). Grow lights can be used indoors as well.
    Indoor vertical gardening isn’t for everyone, but if you’ve got the space you can make it happen! Aeroponics vertical gardening kits like can also make indoor vertical gardening a whole lot easier (See Chapter 11 on aeroponics for more info).
    Patio Vertical Gardens
    If you don’t have yard space to grow a vertical garden, you can plan on using an available patio, deck or balcony instead. Patios can be just as effective for growing a vertical garden. As long as it gets enough sunlight throughout the day, you should have no problem getting things set up. Just research the types of plants you want to grow to see how you should design your garden for maximum plant production.
    Since you are limited in the amount of space that you’re able to use, you’re going to have to get creative with the type of structures that you use. Some ideas include trellises, arbors, pyramid-shaped assemblies, fencing, tripods and containers. If you are going to be planting vining plants and others that spread rapidly, you will find vertical gardening on your patio to be quite successful.
    To maximize the usage of space, you can use hanging containers, upside down planters and baskets that can be hung on railings, canopies or arbors. Having a row of plants on shelves can also produce more space for other structures you may want to use.
    You can also use vertical planters like the one pictured below to grow more in a small patio space.

     

Choosing the Type of Structures to Use for Your Vertical Garden
    As mentioned, there are many different types of structures that you can use for your vertical garden. There are a multitude of possible setups for the different types of plants that you’ll be growing.
    It’s important to note how heavy your plants will become and how much weight the structure is able to handle so that your vegetation will have enough support as it grows. The structures you use should be anchored into the ground, so that it’s not easy to tip over by passersby and your growing plants.
    This is especially important when growing heavier vining plants like melons, pumpkins and squash. These plants absolutely thrive in vertical gardenings and you would be surprised how big and fast they will grow. All of these plants love “climbing” with their vines and lots of sunlight and I’ve seen 40 pound pumpkins growing from a vertical garden – so